Alabama Police Work to End a Kidnapping Standoff

MIDLAND CITY, Ala. - As a police standoff with an Alabama man accused of holding a 5-year-old boy hostage in an underground bunker entered its fifth day on Saturday, authorities were saying little except that talks with the 65-year-old loner were continuing through a ventilation pipe.

Negotiators were working late Friday to persuade Jimmy Lee Dykes to surrender. Police have said they believe the Vietnam-era veteran fatally shot a school bus driver on Tuesday, and then abducted the boy from the bus.

Police have used a ventilation pipe to the bunker to talk to the man and deliver the boy medication for his emotional disorders, but they have not revealed how often they are in touch or what the conversations have been about.